We had to go to Kelowna on an unplanned trip last week. Zakary’s great-aunt passed away and on Thursday, her birthday, we attended a celebration of her life. Our son did us proud: we were able to stay for the whole ceremony and he only made a few loud comments that I’m sure everyone accepted as just another proof that life goes on. He was cute. He was fun. It’s almost a pleasure, now, to travel with him. He charmed everyone and probably took everyone’s mind off the sadness of the moment. Zak’s great-uncle (the husband of the deceased) even spoke French with him. His parents were both French-Canadians, but noone has heard him speak French in a long time… He won’t speak French to me, but he spoke French to our son as he played with him. They were really cute together.

We don’t usually go in the summer because it’s way too warm. Right now, we are in the middle of an ultra-dry summer that sparked several wildfires. Kelowna is an oasis of irrigated orchards in the middle of the desert. It was hot and dry in the sun (luckily, our rented car had air conditioning). We saw the traces of one of the fires, the clouds of smoke coming from another, it rained ashes on Thursday, and on Saturday we witnessed two lightning strikes during a thunderstorm, one of which lit a fire.

But all in all, it was a wonderful holiday. We celebrated a long and full life (the deceased was a month short of the 90th birthday), we met loving family members who spent some quality time with our son, we picked apricots, we picked more apricots, we froze apricots, we dried apricots, we made apricot jam… Did I mention we picked apricots? Zakary’s grandmother’s orchard has a few apricot trees that were loaded with fruits. Of course, I don’t like apricots. Go figure. But I can’t wait until our September trip when it will be time to pick grapes, plums, apples and pears. Now we’re talking!

And on our way back, we found out that a warm spell is heading towards Vancouver where it should be in the mid-30 degrees all week. Argh!

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on Monday, July 27th, 2009 at 6:37 am and is filed under Family life.
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